Point of View: The World Wise Web

Should Tim Berners-Lee's dream of the Semantic Web and the rise of intelligent software that can filter information, mine data and make decisions for us come true, will advertising become just another algorithm, with no need for ad agencies or planners? In this column, Tracey Follows looks at the difference between knowledge and wisdom and argues that planners will always have the wisdom to transform the worldwide web's information into real and useful knowledge.

Point of View: The World Wise Web

Tracey FollowsJWT London

Tim Berners-Lee once dreamt about the Semantic Web and the rise of intelligent agents – software that can filter information, mine data and make decisions for us. When that day comes, will we need ad agencies, or planners? Will advertising become just another algorithm? Will the internet swallow planning, in the way that it has swallowed so much of advertising communications already, from the classified press to our everyday TV?

This is where I like to turn to Weike and his sense-making philosophy, because Weike suggests that unlike computers,...

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